Tar Baby - Toni Morrison

Son didn’t mean to snatch it. Just to end it somehow. Stop the crease, the sunlight, the click click click. And when he did she looked at him with confusion at first, then with evolved anger. “What’s the matter with you?”

It wasn’t nice. To snatch the camera and then to have to tell her about the sleeping arrangements—it wasn’t nice. Not nice at all.

He took her to Old Man’s, and after supper there to Rosa’s. Drake and Soldier picked them up and drove them to a joint in Poncie called Night Moves, where there was live music, Bar B Que sandwiches and unrestrained dancing under four blue lights that neither flashed or strobed. They even managed some snatch in the car—Jadine under the impression that nobody knew; he aware that everybody did. The back seat turned her volume up, but the beer and the bad whiskey made her so sleepy there was no problem when he left her at Rosa’s. She slept like a boulder for three hours, then woke missing him and suffocating in that little bedroom without windows. She sat up naked, for she never wore nightgowns, and held her shoulders. The room had a door to the living room and one that opened to the back yard. She opened the latter and looked out into the blackest nothing she had ever seen. Blacker and bleaker than Isle des Chevaliers, and loud. Loud with the presence of plants and field life. If she was wanting air, there wasn’t any. It’s not possible, she thought, for anything to be this black. Maybe if she stood there long enough light would come from somewhere, and she could see shadows, the outline of something, a bush, a tree, a line between earth and sky, a heavier darkness to show where this very house stopped and space began. She remembered the blackness she saw when Son told her to close her eyes, and to put a star in it. That would be the only way it would get there, she thought, for the world in the direction of the sky, in that place where the sky ought to be, was starless. Haze, she guessed; there must be haze in the sky. Otherwise there would be a moon, at the least. The loudness of the plants was not audible, but it was strong nonetheless. She might as well have been in a cave, a grave, the dark womb of the earth, suffocating with the sound of plant life moving, but deprived of its sight. She could see nothing and could not remember what she had seen when it was daylight. A movement behind made her jump and turn around. Rosa was standing in the inner doorway, lit from behind by a lamp.

“Anything the matter? I heard you moving around.”

Jadine closed the back door. The lamplight from the other door was weak but it was healthy enough to spotlight her nakedness. Rosa gazed down Jadine’s body with a small bowing of her head, and then up again. Her eyes traveled slowly, moving like one of those growing plants Jadine could not see, but whose presence was cracking loud.

“Why didn’t you tell me you didn’t have no nightclothes. I got somethin I can let you have,” Rosa said.

“I…I forgot,” said Jadine. “I forgot to bring anything.”

“I’ll get you something.”

When Rosa came back, Jadine was in the bed. Rosa handed her a kind of slip, wrinkled but clean-smelling.

“You all right, daughter?”

“Oh, I’m fine. I just got too warm and wanted some air,” Jadine answered.

“This used to be a porch. I made it into a extra room, but it does heat up. I didn’t feel like buyin no windows.”

“Can you leave the back door open?” asked Jadine.

“I wouldn’t advise it. Anything at all might come in here out of those trees. I got a little old electric fan I’ll get you.”

“No. No. Don’t bother.”

“You sure?”

“Yes.”

“It’s beat up, but it stirs the air around.”

“It’s okay.”

“Well, I’ll leave this here door open.” Rosa propped a wooden slatback chair against the inner door. “Sorry,” she said. “That gown ain’t much, but it’ll cover you.”

“Thanks,” said Jadine, but it didn’t cover her. She lay down in the slip under the sheet and her nakedness before Rosa lay down with her. No man had made her feel that naked, that unclothed. Leerers, lovers, doctors, artists—none of them had made her feel exposed. More than exposed. Obscene.

God. Eloe.

They were leaving Sunday. Surely she could get through a Sunday and then she and Son would be back on the train holding hands, and then on the airplane playing with each other under the Delta Airlines blanket—their faces serene as passengers, their hands devious and directed. She fell asleep on that thought and woke at ten-thirty with Rosa’s fingertips tapping her on the shoulder.

“Son’s in there,” she said. “You all goin to eat with me, ain’t you?”

Jadine got up and dressed quickly. He was sitting at the table looking more beautiful than after the first haircut on Isle des Chevaliers, more beautiful than when he stood at the piano with his coat over his shoulder and she saw savannas in his face, more beautiful than on the beach when he touched her foot, than when he opened the door to his room at the Hilton. She wanted to sit in his lap, but Drake and Soldier were at the table too, so she just walked over and put her hand on his head. He smiled up at her and kissed the palm of her other hand. Drake and Soldier looked bathed and glittery. They beamed at Son with the same adoration she did, but they didn’t compete. They sat back and enjoyed his presence and his prize woman. They looked at him with love and looked at her like she was a Cadillac he had won, or stolen, or even bought for all they knew.

“YOU ALL gettin hitched?” Soldier asked. They were alone in the house while Son and Drake drove Rosa to church.

“I guess so,” Jadine answered. “We haven’t talked about it.”

“He’s good. You ought to snatch him.”

She laughed. “Should I?”

“Damn right. You don’t, somebody else sure will. He was married before, you know.”

“I know.”

“Never should have married that woman. That Cheyenne. Every one of us told him that, or tried to. But he did it anyway to his grief and sorrow.”

“Was she pretty?” asked Jadine. She didn’t want to ask it, but it seemed extremely important to know the answer.

“Naw. I wouldn’t say pretty. Not bad-lookin, mind, but nothin like pretty.”

“He must have loved her, though.”

“That could be what it was.” Soldier sounded as though there were some doubts. “Naw,” he said. “She wasn’t pretty, but you had to hand it to her though. She had the best pussy in Florida, the absolute best,” and he turned his eyes on Jadine as if to say Now top that!

It wasn’t nice. Not nice at all. Son embarrassed her in the road with the camera; Rosa made her feel like a slut; and now Soldier was trying to make her feel like a virgin competing with…She didn’t answer him so he went on.

“You ever been married?”

“No,” she said, and looked squarely in his face thinking, if he says “Good-lookin woman like you ought to be able…” she would smack him in the mouth. But all he said was “Too bad,” and that didn’t seem definite enough to break his face for.

“Any children?”

“You ask too many questions,” she said. “Anything you want to know about me ask Son.”

Soldier smiled at that and shook his head. “Son don’t talk about his women and don’t let nobody else talk about em either.”

“I’m glad of that,” she said.

“I ain’t. Keeps him dumb. He wouldn’t know a good woman from a snake and he won’t let nobody point out the difference.”

“Can he tell the difference between a good man and a snake?”

“Oh, yeah. Son knows people. He just gets confused when it comes to women. With most everything else he thinks with his heart. But when it comes to women he thinks with his dick, you know what I mean?”

“Some people think with their mouths.”

“Yeah. I guess you right about that.” Soldier smiled. “But maybe it’s better’n not thinkin at all.”

“How would you know?” she asked him.

He laughed. “You a hot one, ain’t you?”

“Yes, I’m a hot one.”

“Yeah.” He ran his fingers over the place on his head where his hair was thinning. “A hot one all right and a live one too.”

“Believe it.” She got up to pour herself more coffee.

Soldier scanned her hips. “Can I ask you somethin?”

“What?”

“Who’s controllin it?”

“Controlling what?”

“The thing. The thing between you two. Who’s in control?”

“Nobody. We’re together. Nobody controls anybody,” she said.

“Good,” he said. “That’s real good. Son, he don’t like control. Makes him, you know wildlike.”

“We don’t have that kind of relationship. I don’t like to be controlled either.”

“But you like to have it, don’t you?”

“Not with him.”

“Good. Good.”

“Did Cheyenne have control?” She sat down and stirred air into her coffee.

“Cheyenne? Naw. She didn’t control nothin. At least not during the day. But good God she sure did run the nights.” He laughed and then, since she did not join in, he sobered quickly and asked, “How long you all plannin to stay around?”

Jadine repressed a smile. He’d lost, and wanted her out of town. “We’re leaving today.”

“Today? You can’t leave today.”

“Why not?”

“Ernie Paul is coming. We called him up. He left from Montgomery already, be here Monday.” Soldier was alarmed.

“Who’s Ernie Paul?”

“He’s one of us. Grew up with Son and Drake and me. He takin off work to come down and see Son and all of us.”

TKO, thought Jadine, but she didn’t hang up her gloves. When Son got back she showed him the train schedule.

“One more night, baby,” he said.

“I can’t. Not in that room. Not alone.”

“Come on.”

“No, Son. Not unless you stay with me.”

“I can’t do that.”

“Then I’m leaving. I’m long past fourteen.”

“Okay. Look. After church, when Rosa gets back, we’ll go for a ride.”

“Son.”

“Listen now. Let me show you this county. Bring your camera. Then tonight you go back to Rosa’s…”

“Son.”

“Wait. Leave the back door open. I’ll come in and stay with you all night. And in the morning I’ll go round the front like I just got there.”

“You promise.”

“I promise.”

Paleolithic, she thought. I am stuck here with a pack of Neanderthals who think sex is dirty or strange or something and he is standing here almost thirty years old doing it too. Stupid. “Stupid,” she said aloud.

“I know, but that’s the way they are. What do you want me to do? You think anything we do is going to change them?”

“I want us to be honest.”

“Can’t we be gentle first, and honest later?”

Accommodating beyond all belief. Because it was his hometown and his people, she supposed. She photographed everything during the ride until she was out of film. They found sheds and orchards to make love in and an open window of a schoolhouse with a teacher’s desk wide enough for two. They got back to Eloe at eight and stayed out as late as they could—when Night Moves closed—then gave everybody a ride home. When Jadine got to Rosa’s she put on the wrinkled slip to amuse him when he returned, unlatched the door and got in the bed. Half an hour later he was there. She had been listening carefully so she heard the swing of the door.

“Son?”

“Yeah.”

“Hurry up.”

He hurried. Something was in his hand as he knelt by the bed, leaves or fern or something. He made her take the slip off and he brushed her all over with the fern and she tried not to moan or laugh or cry out while he was saying Sssh, sssh. He undressed and climbed in. Jadine opened her arms to this man accustomed to the best pussy in Florida. It must have been that thought, put there by Soldier, that made her competitive, made her struggle to outdo Cheyenne and surpass her legendary gifts. She was thinking of her, whipped on by her, and that, perhaps, plus the fact that she had left the door unlatched and Son had opened it on its hinges and after it was open on its hinges it stayed wide open but they had not noticed because they were paying attention only to each other so that must have been why and how Cheyenne got in, and then the rest: Rosa and Thérèse and Son’s dead mother and Sally Sarah Sadie Brown and Ondine and Soldier’s wife Ellen and Francine from the mental institution and her own dead mother and even the woman in yellow. All there crowding into the room. Some of them she did not know, recognize, but they were all there spoiling her love-making, taking away her sex like succubi, but not his. He fell asleep and didn’t see the women in the room and she didn’t either but they were there crowding each other and watching her. Pushing each other—nudging for space, they poured out of the dark like ants out of a hive. She shook Son and he woke saying “Huh?” and she said “Shouldn’t you close the door” because she didn’t want to say there are women in the room; I can’t see them, but this room is full of women. He said, “Yeah,” and went back to sleep. She just lay there, too frightened to do it herself for then she would have to walk through the crowd of women standing in the pitch-dark room whom she could not see but would have to touch to get through them. And she felt them nudging each other for a better look at her, until finally being frightened was worse than anything they could do to her so she got mad and sat up. Her voice was half as loud as her heart.

“What do you want with me, goddamn it!”

They looked as though they had just been waiting for that question and they each pulled out a breast and showed it to her. Jadine started to tremble. They stood around in the room, jostling each other gently, gently—there wasn’t much room—revealing one breast and then two and Jadine was shocked. This was not the dream of hats for in that she was asleep, her eyes closed. Here she was wide-awake, but in total darkness looking at her own mother for God’s sake and Nanadine!

“I have breasts too,” she said or thought or willed, “I have breasts too.” But they didn’t believe her. They just held their own higher and pushed their own farther out and looked at her. All of them revealing both their breasts except the woman in yellow. She did something more shocking—she stretched out a long arm and showed Jadine her three big eggs. It scared her so, she began to cry. Her back pressed hard, hard into the wall, her right hand in a ball over her stomach, she shook Son and shook him some more. When he stirred and woke she slammed her face into his shoulder crying.

“What is it? What’s going on?”

“Tell them to leave me alone.”

“What?”

“Hold me.”

“Jadine.”

“Shut the door. No, don’t move. Hold me.”

“Those hats again?”

“No.”

“What?”

“Hold me.”

And he did. Till morning. Even while he slept and she didn’t and the women finally went away—sighing—he did not let her go.

Nobody was fooled by that little charade. Old Man guessed, the men knew and Rosa heard them as clear as the radio.